Thich Nhat Hanh
Short biography based on wikipedia 2006
Thich Nhat Hanh (Thích Nhất Hạnh) is an expatriate Vietnamese
Zen Buddhist monk. A teacher, author, and peace activist, Nhat Hanh was
born in central Vietnam on October 11, 1926. He joined a Zen monastery
at the age of 16, studied Buddhism as a novice, and was fully ordained
as a monk in 1949. The title Thích is used by all Vietnamese monks and
nuns, meaning that they are part of the Shakya (Shakyamuni Buddha)
clan. He coined the term Engaged Buddhism in his book Vietnam: Lotus in
a Sea of Fire.
In the early 1960's, he founded the School of Youth for Social Services
(SYSS) in Saigon, a grass roots relief organization that rebuilt bombed
villages, set up schools and medical centers, and resettled families
left homeless during the Vietnam War. He traveled to the U.S. a number
of times to study and later teach at Columbia University, and to
promote the cause of peace. He urged Martin Luther King, Jr. to oppose
the Vietnam War publicly, and spoke with many people and groups about
peace. In 1967, King nominated him for the Nobel Peace Prize. Nhat Hanh
led the Buddhist delegation to the Paris Peace Talks. One of the best
known Buddhist teachers in the West, Thich Nhat Hanh's teachings and
practices appeal to people from various religious, spiritual, and
political backgrounds. He offers a practice of mindfulness that is
often adapted to Western sensibilities.
He created the Order of Interbeing in 1966, and established monastic
and practice centers around the world. His home is Plum Village
Monastery in the Dordogne region in the South of France. He travels
internationally giving retreats and talks. Exiled from Vietnam for many
years, he was allowed to return for a trip in 2005. He has published
more than 100 books, including more than 40 in English. He also
publishes a quarterly Dharma talk in the journal of the Order of
Interbeing, the Mindfulness Bell. Nhat Hanh continues to be active in
the peace movement. He has sponsored retreats for Israelis and
Palestinians, encouraging them to listen and learn about each other;
given speeches urging warring countries to stop fighting and look for
non-violent solutions to problems; and conducted a peace walk in Los
Angeles in 2005 attended by thousands of people.
Biography
Thich Nhat Hanh was born Nguyễn Xuân Bảo in Thừa Thiên
(Central Vietnam) in 1926. At the age of 16 he entered the monastery at
Từ Hiếu Temple near Huế, Vietnam, where his primary teacher was Dhyana
(meditation; Zen) Master Thanh Quý Chân Thật. A graduate of Bao Quoc
Buddhist Academy in Central Vietnam,[2] Thich Nhat Hanh received
training in Zen (in Vietnamese: Thiền) and the Mahayana school of
Buddhism and was ordained as a monk in 1949. Thich Nhat Hanh is now
recognized as a Dharmacharya and as the spiritual head of the Từ Hiếu
Temple and associated monasteries. He is the Elder of the Từ Hiếu
branch of the 8th generation of the Liễu Quán lineage in the 42nd
generation of the Lâm Tế Dhyana school (Lin Chi Chan in
Chinese or Rinzai Zen
in Japanese). On May 1st, 1966 at Từ Hiếu Temple, Thich Nhat Hanh
received the “lamp transmission”, making him a Dharmacharya or Dharma
Teacher, from Master Chân Thật. Thich Nhat Hanh has combined his deep
knowledge of a variety of traditional Zen teaching methods with methods
from Theravada Buddhism and ideas from Western psychology to form his
approach to modern Zen practice. Thich Nhat Hanh has become an
important influence in the development of Western Buddhism.
In 1956 he was named Editor-in-Chief of Vietnamese Buddhism, the
periodical of the Unified Vietnam Buddhist Association (Giáo Hội Phật
Giáo Việt Nam Thống Nhất). In the following years he founded Lá Bối
Press, the Van Hanh Buddhist University in Saigon, and the School of
Youth for Social Service (SYSS), a corps of Buddhist peace workers who
went into rural areas to establish schools, build health care clinics,
and help re-build villages.
During the Vietnam War
Van Hanh Buddhist University became a prestigious private
university that focused on Buddhist studies, Vietnamese culture, and
languages. Nhat Hanh taught Buddhist psychology and Prajnaparamita
literature. At a meeting in April 1965, Van Hanh Union students issued
a Call for Peace statement. Its main theme was: "It is time for North
and South Vietnam to find a way to stop the war and help all Vietnamese
people live peacefully and with mutual respect." When Thich Nhat Hanh
left for the U.S. shortly afterwards, control over Van Hanh University
was taken over by one of the Chancellors who wished to sever ties with
Thich Nhat Hanh and the SYSS, calling Sister Chan Khong, who was left
in control of the organization, a "communist". From that point, the
SYSS struggled to raise funds and endured a number of attacks on its
members, many of whom were threatened, harassed, and murdered. The SYSS
persisted in their efforts, refusing to take sides in the conflict and
continuing to provide aid to people in need.
Thich Nhat Hanh has been a leader in the Engaged Buddhism movement and
he is credited with bringing the idea to the West. He credits the
thirteenth-century Vietnamese King Tran Nhan Tong with the origination
of the concept. Tran Nhan Tong abdicated his throne to become a monk,
and founded the still dominant Vietnamese Buddhist school, the Bamboo
Forest tradition.
In 1960, Thich Nhat Hanh came to the U.S. to study comparative religion
at Princeton University, and he was subsequently appointed lecturer in
Buddhism at Columbia University. By then, he had gained fluency in
French, Chinese, Sanskrit, Pali, Japanese, and English, in addition to
his native Vietnamese. In 1963 he returned to Vietnam to aid his fellow
monks in their non-violent peace efforts.
Thich Nhat Hanh returned to the US in 1966 to lead a symposium in
Vietnamese Buddhism at Cornell University and to continue his work for
peace. Thich Nhat Hanh had written a letter to Martin Luther King, Jr.
in 1965 entitled:“Searching for the Enemy of Man” and it was during his
1966 stay in the U.S. that Thich Nhat Hanh met with Martin Luther King,
Jr. and urged him to publicly denounce the Vietnam War.
Dr. King gave his famous speech at the Riverside Church in New York
City in 1967, his first to publicly question the U.S. involvement in
Vietnam. Later that year, Dr. King nominated Thich Nhat Hanh for the
1967 Nobel Peace Prize. In his nomination Rev. King said, "I do not
personally know of anyone more worthy of [this prize] than this gentle
monk from Vietnam. His ideas for peace, if applied, would build a
monument to ecumenism, to world brotherhood, to humanity." (Despite
King's high praise, the committee decided not to make an award that
year. King's revelation of his nomination was a violation of tradition
and the explicit "strong request" of the prize committee.)
In 1969, Thich Nhat Hanh was the delegate for the Buddhist Peace
Delegation at the Paris Peace talks. When the Paris Peace Accords were
signed in 1973, the Vietnamese government denied Thich Nhat Hanh
permission to return to Vietnam, and he went into exile in France. From
1976 through 1977, he led efforts to help rescue Vietnamese boat people
in the Gulf of Siam, but was forced to stop because of the hostility of
the governments of Thailand and Singapore. In 1969, Thich Nhat Hanh
established the Unified Buddhist Church (Église Bouddhique Unifiée) in
France (not a part of the Unified Buddhist Church of Vietnam).
Establishing the Order of Interbeing
In 1975, he formed the Sweet Potatoes Meditation Center. The
center grew and in 1982 he and his colleague Sister Chân Không founded
Plum Village Buddhist Center (Làng Mai), a monastery and Practice
Center in the Dordogne in the south of France. Since the mid 60s he
heads a monastic and lay group, the Order of Inter-Being, teaching the
Five and Fourteen Mindfulness Trainings and "Engaged Buddhism." The
Unified Buddhist Church is the legally recognized governance body for
PlumVillage (Làng Mai) in France; for Maple Forest Monastery and Green
Mountain Dharma Center in Vermont, the Community of Mindful Living,
Parallax Press, Deer Park Monastery in California, and Magnolia Village
in Mississippi.
There are now two monasteries in Vietnam, at the original Từ Hiếu
Temple near Huế and at Prajna Temple in the central highlands. Thich
Nhat Hanh and the Order of Interbeing have established monasteries and
Dharma centers in the United States at Deer Park Monastery (Tu Viện Lộc
Uyển) in Escondido, California, Maple Forest Monastery (Tu Viện Rừng
Phong) and Green Mountain Dharma Center (ÐạoTràng Thanh Sơn) both in
Vermont, and Magnolia Village Practice Center (Đạo Tràng Mộc Lan) in
Mississippi. These monasteries are open to the public during much of
the year and provide on-going retreats for laypeople. The Order of
Interbeing also holds focused retreats for groups of lay people, such
as families, teenagers, veterans, the entertainment industry, members
of Congress, law enforcement officers, people of color, and
professional and scientific interest groups.
Return to Vietnam
From January 12 until April 11, 2005, Thich Nhat Hanh returned to
Vietnam after a series of negotiations that allowed him to teach, have
select titles of his books published in Vietnamese, and allowed 100
monastic and 90 lay members of his Order to accompany him in his
travels around the country, including a return to his root temple, Tu
Hieu Temple in Hue.
Prior to the 2005 trip, Thich Nhat Hanh’s organization had been highly
critical of the restrictions imposed by the Vietnamese government
regarding a possible visit. Those restrictions included: not allowing
his monastics to stay in Buddhist monasteries, not allowing him to
teach to large crowds as he does in the West, and not allowing his
books to be published in Vietnamese.
The trip was not without controversy. Thich Vien Dinh writing on behalf
of the Unified Buddhist Church of Vietnam (considered illegal by the
Vietnamese government) called for Thich Nhat Hanh to make a statement
against the Vietnam government’s poor record on religious freedom.
Thich Vien Dinh feared that the trip would be used as propaganda by the
Vietnamese government, making the world believe that the issues of
religious freedom are improving there, while abuses continue.
